I'm a directionally-challenged college student who will be studying abroad in France next semester. (I finally got my driver's license last semester but still have no sense of direction.) My 21st birthday's coming up later this month, and my mom is asking me what I want. It can't be too expensive because of the cost of college and studying abroad (preferably under $250). This is what I would love to have: a PDA with GPS (with easy to follow directions for car and pedestrian in the US and in France), Microsoft Word, address book and mp3 player. Could you help me decide which one to ask for? Thanks! Robyn

P.S. After looking around a bit, I saw that the PDA can also include phone and internet capabilities. That would be really cool, but is probably outside the price range. If I did decide to go for such special features, would they work in France? I would also like to have a French dictionary and Bible software added. But I think it's getting too expensive already. I don't really need anything like that, but if you know of any great deals that would make it affordable, let me know!

If you can live with external GPS, you can get a cheap PDA and a cheap GPS. You might still end up spending more than $250. Look around the reviews of PDAs and GPS packages on this site to see your options.

If you want a smartphone (PDA + phone), here is our smartphone reviews: